


Timelines

by bunyoul



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Time Travel, inspired by the connect music film video, the ships aren't part of the main plot but are heavily implied
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-06 05:33:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14049993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bunyoul/pseuds/bunyoul
Summary: Hyungwon disappears five days before time travel is declared illegal.





	Timelines

**Author's Note:**

> alternative title: local biology student pretends they know enough about physics to write fics involving time travel theories  
> 5.9k words of time travel and non-linear plotlines that i somehow managed to write in one sitting because the connect video was a very good motivator

 

_ Train Station  
22:10 _

 

Hyungwon disappears five days before time travel is declared illegal.

 

He’s on a train when it happens- Kihyun sees him off at one station, shoving him in through the doors with a half-teasing statement that he should leave as fast as possible so he can get some sleep. Minhyuk waits at the next station along for him to arrive.

 

A text of ‘ _ I should be there in 5 minutes’ _ is the last they hear of him.

 

He doesn’t arrive at the next station along, doesn’t show up later that night with apologies that he fell asleep in his seat, doesn’t appear the next morning, or the day after. 

 

Somewhere, between stations and the sway and rattle of the train carriages, Hyungwon disappears off the face of the earth, leaving no traces behind.

 

The search is short lived- the discovery of watches built for time travel in Hyungwon’s room tells the police enough; tells them that searching is a lost cause. No matter how much Kihyun argues, how much Hoseok pleads, the search is discontinued within days. Another person to befall the risks of time travel- they write it off as.

 

The reclassification of time travel as a criminal offence is legislated only a day later, and all of Hyungwon’s research- all of the chances they could have found of going back to fix things- are bundled into high-security vehicles and taken away.

 

_ Cafe  
11:34 [after] _

 

They still meet each week on Thursdays, in the hours where it’s too early for lunch but too late for breakfast, crowding around the large table in the corner of the cafe, placed in the light of the window. The cars move past, sluggish, outside. 

 

Sometimes the conversation falls on normal topics- Kihyun complains about deadlines, Jooheon coughs after a bit of his muffin catches in his throat, Hyunwoo spills his coffee and Minhyuk laughs, Hoseok tripping over his feet in his attempt to scramble past Changkyun to get napkins. The only thing missing is Hyungwon, half asleep in the seat closest to the window, spinning his pocket-watch around on the table in front of him.

 

Mostly they talk about time travel. Hushed voices become the norm, crowding closely over books, equations and newspaper clippings as Changkyun taps into the security cameras on his laptop and directs them away from their table. 

 

“Anything new?” Kihyun asks after taking a drink of coffee, his glasses perched on the end of his nose. A book of equations is opened out on the table- scribbled numbers, calculations and messy annotations- and he has ink smudged across his fingers. 

 

“We’re still looking through security footage- nothing yet though.” Changkyun nods in agreement to Jooheon’s statement. 

 

“Getting you access to the books on space-time mathematics took a lot of time so we still haven’t made much progress.” The youngest motions to his laptop as he speaks. “We’re picking up our pace again though.” 

 

“Hyunwoo had another vision.” Minhyuk casts a sideways glance at Hyunwoo, and Hoseok sits up quickly as he nods to confirm Minhyuk’s statement.

 

“It wasn’t anything different- just the train and the tunnels again.” 

 

The visions were the reason they still searched for Hyungwon. At first they had just been feelings- a sensation that he was still out there, not a lost cause as they had been previously told- then they branched into dreams, and finally into moments of foresight in broad daylight, views of trains and back-lit tunnels, empty stations in the middle of the night.

 

Hyungwon had spent his life playing with time and space in the comfort of his dorm room- experimenting with watches and timelines like an artist would experiment with paint colours. He dropped glasses of water off countertops and reversed them before they hit the ground, repeated the same conversations five times over for the sake of seeing each different outcome, played with watches to make them work faster, better. Timelines seemed to warp around Hyungwon- and around his two roommates; as their visions of something not quite linear seemed to show.

 

“What about you, Kihyun, Hoseok?” Jooheon asks, sliding Changkyun’s laptop along the table to type something on it. Kihyun looks down at his calculations, thinking back to the board of calculations he left in the lecture theatre and the stack of contraband books hidden under his notes in his bag. 

 

“It’s a work in progress.” His response sounds more defeated than he would like it to. “I’m working hard at it,”

 

Hoseok laughs, almost bitter sounding, from where he’s sat with his head against the window. “By working hard he means he’s staying up till past midnight taking notes and forgetting to even eat unless I come and tell him to.”

 

Kihyun’s foot collides with Hoseok’s shin underneath the table. “I can take care of myself perfectly fine.” He knows that the bags under his eyes and the pen smudged on his cheek from where he fell asleep at his desk for the third night in a row says otherwise. “I’m probably the most capable out of all of you.”

 

Jooheon rolls his eyes, earning a glare from Kihyun, and the conversation falls back into normality again- albeit with the absence of the steady ticking of Hyungwon’s pocket watch beside them. 

 

_ Hyungwon’s Room  
10:17 [before] _

 

They’re all crowded into Hyungwon’s room- seven of them curled up on the bed and the floor, books spread out in front of them as they study and talk quietly. Hyunwoo is drawing a flower in the corner, its petals wilting as he catches them in charcoal on the pages of his sketchpad. At the opposite side of the room, Hoseok has a physics textbook balanced on his knees and nobody has the heart to tell him that, every time he taps his pen against his forehead in frustration, he smudges a little more ink at the edges of his hairline. Hyungwon is sprawled out on the bed, feet in Kihyun’s lap, legs being used as a stand for Kihyun’s notebooks while he writes out calculations. Jooheon and Changkyun crowd around a laptop screen, Minhyuk using Jooheon’s shoulder as a headrest and asking quiet questions about what they’re typing. 

 

The fan placed on the desk in the corner of the room does little to quell the summer heat, only pushing warm air around the room a little faster, its blades whirring quietly as they carry out their task despite its futility.

 

Hyungwon has his pocket watch in hand, swinging it backwards and forwards, distracted. It feels like early evening despite the day not having reached noon yet.

 

Time seems to pass slowly when Hyungwon is around- like the world has no hesitations to slow down just for him. 

 

_ Lecture Theatre  
23:55 [after] _

 

Hoseok knows he’ll find Kihyun working. 

 

The halls are dark and silent as he walks along them, guided by the watery glow of his phone screen and the light creeping under the door of the furthermost lecture theatre.

 

Kihyun is standing in front of a board of calculations as Hoseok pushes the door open quietly, numbers written as high as he can reach with annotations that only he can understand pushed between the equations. His whiteboard pen is tucked behind his ear and his frazzled appearance indicates that he likely hasn’t moved since Hoseok last saw him at lunch time. 

 

“Kihyun, you should finish up for tonight.” Hoseok speaks quietly, but Kihyun still jumps, startled. A look of confusion passes across his face as he struggles to pull his thoughts together enough to register Hoseok standing there. There’s a slight shakiness to his movements as he turns back to face the whiteboard that can be easily connected back to the empty takeaway coffee cups discarded on his desk. 

 

“No, I’m still working.” Kihyun reaches up to write something next to one of the calculations, almost stumbling as he does so. Stepping closer, Hoseok eases the pen out of Kihyun’s hand and corrects one of his answers, noticing an error as he surveys the board. 

 

“You’re not going to be able to concentrate if you’re tired.” Hoseok tries to keep the worry from creeping into his voice.

 

Kihyun snatches the pen back and turns to face the board again. “I’m not tired.” His words are muffled by a yawn that escapes into the quiet of the lecture hall. The streetlamps cast a weak glow in through the window, catching on the dust that spirals in the air; patternless. 

 

“I want to get Hyungwon back as much as you do,” Hoseok speaks hesitantly. “But hurting yourself in the process isn’t a good idea either.” Kihyun pauses, then stops writing, the pen dropping out of his hand. His shoulders slump forwards as if all of his weariness had crashed over him at once, and he doesn’t complain as Hoseok wraps a coat around his shoulders and picks his bag up for him.

 

“Let’s go.” Hoseok guides Kihyun out of the room, an arm wrapped around his shoulders to keep him upright as they make it down the corridor and into the night air outside.

 

The sky is filled with stars, but they barely look up from the pavement as they make their way slowly home.

 

_ Computer Room  
17:09 [before] _

 

“Jooheon, how many times have I told you to stop hacking into my computer.” Kihyun throws open the door to the computer room. The sound of it hitting the opposite wall echoes heavily- bouncing between the desks and monitor screens. Jooheon looks up from his chair in the corner, startled.

 

The computer room is Changkyun and Jooheon’s pride and joy- a basement storage space filled with monitor screens stacked in threes, neon lights casting an artificial glow on cold, stone walls. They spend most of their time there, hiding away from the warm summer air and occupying themselves with codes, computers and takeaway pizzas.

 

Changkyun pushes away from his laptop, wheeling himself into the middle of the room, still sat in his desk chair, and waves at Kihyun, grinning. 

 

“It’s been a while since you last came down to visit us Kihyun!” Changkyun’s sideways glance after his over-enthusiastic greeting alerts Kihyun to the sight of Jooheon attempting to creep out of the door unseen. Upon being spotted, he breaks out into a run, attempting to dodge past Kihyun and out of the computer room. Kihyun catches hold of the sleeve of his shirt and pulls him back. 

 

“I reiterate- Jooheon, stop hacking into my computer.” A sigh escapes Jooheon and he falls back into his chair. In the corner, Changkyun turns to his laptop to cover up the beginnings of a laugh with the sounds of typing. 

 

“Okay, mom.” Jooheon- curse the existence of wheeled chairs- kicks the ground and rolls himself across the floor, and before he can retaliate, Changkyun has shut the lights off and Kihyun finds himself being pushed ungracefully out of the room, the door slamming shut and locking behind him. The sound of laughter and the lights being flicked back on can be heard from inside.

 

Hyungwon is waiting for him at the top of the stairs as he emerges, leaning against the wall in a bored manner. He peels himself up from the brickwork as Kihyun shakes his head. 

 

“They kicked me out before I could do anything,” Kihyun sighs. “Again.” 

 

“If you went back and did it again you’d know what they were planning.” Hyungwon holds out his hand, the surface of his pocket watch peeking out from between his fingers and an amicable smile on his face. Kihyun shakes his head.

 

“I don’t do time travel, you know that.” At Kihyun’s response, Hyungwon nods, understanding, and returns the watch to his pocket.

 

“Just a suggestion.” Hyungwon glances down the street, clouds moving slowly, liquid-like, overhead. “Minhyuk is in the ice cream shop at the moment- we should go and meet him.” 

 

The statement causes Kihyun to question how many times Hyungwon has lived through this day- how many times he’s taken his watch and gone back to redo things.

 

With Hyungwon, he could never be sure.

 

_ Art Room  
13:36 [after] _

 

Even in Autumn, the art room still feels filled with sunlight. 

 

The paintings propped up by the desks are filled with images of summer; flowers and bright colours lining the walls of the well lit room, mixing with the smell of paint and fruit-scented air fresheners. It’s always kept warm, heaters placed in the corners, and Kihyun shrugs off his coat as he enters. 

 

“Any breakthroughs?” Hyunwoo asks as Kihyun approaches, barely looking up from his painting- a depiction of a train in block colour- as he clears paint pots away from the bench next to him for Kihyun to sit down. 

 

“Nothing yet. Hoseok is checking over some of the calculations so I thought I’d come and bring you lunch.” as if proving his statement, Kihyun pulls a tupperware box and two forks out of his bag and places them on the desk beside him. “It should still be warm.” Minhyuk jumps out of his seat at the promise of food, picking up the container before narrowing his eyes towards Kihyun. 

 

“You have eaten lunch yourself, right?” Minhyuk’s expression is almost accusatory, and Kihyun can only guess that Hoseok has complained about Kihyun choosing studying space-time over eating three full meals a day. 

 

“I have, don’t worry.” Minhyuk nods at Kihyun’s assurance, then pops the lid off the tupperware container and digs into it with one of the forks, barely pausing to check its contents. Kihyun hits Minhyuk lightly in the shoulder. “I could have poisoned that and you wouldn’t even have noticed.” 

 

The warm lighting and wash of watercolour canvases in the background- along with Minhyuk’s laughter and Hyunwoo’s good-humoured warnings to ‘stop arguing  _ please _ ’- almost makes everything seem normal for once.

 

_ Hyungwon’s Room  
01:11 [before] _

 

It’s the early hours of the morning when Hyungwon explains time travel to them.

 

He pulls out his box of watches from under his bed, placing them in front of Kihyun and Minhyuk as they struggle to keep awake, the faint ticking of the watches telling the passage of time in a staccato rhythm. The window in the corner of the room is open and the sound of cars driving past in the street below can be heard, headlights reaching in faintly and adding to the warm light of the desk lamp and the glow-in-the-dark stars that cover Hyungwon’s ceiling. 

 

“These aren’t all mine- they’re just ones that I’m fixing up for other people.” He runs a hand over the watches in the box. The movement seems simultaneously too fast and too slow, as if time is distorting under his touch. “I know how to make them work better, how to make them more accurate.” 

 

They’ve always known about Hyungwon’s involvement with time travel- how he would sleep through the day then go back in time and do things properly, how he would experiment with the watches between classes, how he seemed to harbour a deeper understanding of time than everyone else around him. 

 

Kihyun had learned to do what Hyungwon said- that if he called in the morning with an anxious shakiness to his voice and asked him to  _ please stay indoors _ , then to stay indoors would be the right thing to do.  

 

“What’s it like when you go back?” Minhyuk’s hair is tied up on top of his head and his chin is propped in his hands, sitting cross-legged on the carpet. 

 

“For me, it’s like I’m travelling by train.” Hyungwon explains. “It’s different for everyone though. Some people feel like they’re walking, other people feel like they’re on a bus, in a car. For me it’s trains though- I think it’s because I use them so often.” 

 

“Do you not ever wonder how it all works?” Kihyun rubs his eyes as he asks, trying to shake himself back awake.

 

“I think I’ll leave the maths to you and Hoseok,” Hyungwon shrugs. “To me it just feels like time is a part of me, just as I’m a part of it,” He waves his hands, as if drawing a line between two points. “It’s like I’m connected to it, irreversibly.”

 

_ Lecture Theatre  
16:42 [after] _

 

Conclusions are getting harder to reach.

 

Kihyun can see the pile of books that are helpful slowly diminishing, casting them aside once he’s pulled all the useful information from them. He’s running out of space on the board, equations and notes pushed into all the spaces and gaps he can find, whiteboard pen permanently smudged across his hands from reaching on tiptoes to cram information in the uppermost corners. 

 

He worries at his lower lip with his teeth, frustration beginning to creep into his movements as he falls back into his chair and resumes reading the remaining books spread out on the desk. Looking up to see Hoseok enter the room, Kihyun sighs and re-reads the page he’s been studying for the fourth time. 

 

“Let me take a look?” Hoseok taps the surface of the desk gently to get Kihyun’s attention. His leather jacket and ripped jeans look out of place in the clean-cut environment of the lecture theatre, but Kihyun slides the book over to him regardless, knowing from experience not to presume Hoseok’s capabilities. One of Hoseok’s fingers traces small circles on the back of Kihyun’s neck as he reads, glancing down at the book then up at the board again, clearly frustrated. 

 

They sit in silence- cold autumn sunlight pouring in through the windows and catching on the edges of the chains that hang from Kihyun’s glasses. Time drags on slowly.

 

“I’ve got it.” Hoseok drops the book down onto the desk and bolts to his feet, stooping over to write in the last remaining empty space on the board. Kihyun runs to join him, heartrate picking up as Hoseok starts writing out numbers and letters, pausing to think then continuing, Kihyun processing everything the moment it appears on the surface of the whiteboard.

 

“You’re right.” Kihyun’s voice comes out breathless, amazed, as he looks down at the answer on the board, double-underlined and staring back at them. “We did it.” Kihyun turns to run, to grab his bag and get out of the lecture theatre as fast as possible. Hoseok catches his wrist before he can move anywhere, holding him in place. 

 

“We shouldn’t rush- it could be dangerous.” The hesitation is evident in Hoseok’s voice, and Kihyun pulls his hand free, shaking his wrist loose from the other’s grip.

 

“We have _less than an_ _hour_ if we want to get him back.” Kihyun backs towards the door as Hoseok attempts to stop him again. “We have the exact time- we have to go _now_.” 

 

“Shouldn’t we at least call the others first?” As Hoseok speaks, Kihyun turns to face him, incredulous.  

 

“We’re not Hyungwon,” Bitterness floods Kihyun’s voice as he piles textbooks and notepads into his backpack. “If we mess this up by wasting time, we can’t just take the easy way out and go back to fix it like he always did.”

 

“That,” Hoseok pauses, a sense of disbelief filling his voice. “That was out of line.”

 

Kihyun sighs, heavy, pushing his hair away from his face. “I know. I just,” He turns to look at Hoseok. “I want him back.” 

 

“At least let me call Hyunwoo first.” Before Hoseok can carry out his suggestion, Minhyuk is barrelling in through the lecture theatre door, Hyunwoo close behind him, out of breath. There’s paint drying on the sleeves of Minhyuk’s shirt, indicating that they had come straight from the art room. 

 

“We saw him.” Minhyuk speaks once he’s recovered his breath enough. “We saw him on the train.” 

 

Kihyun nods, swinging his backpack onto his shoulder. “We figured out the formula. There’s a narrow window that we can get to him- after that, I don’t know if we’ll be able to reach him.” Kihyun gestures to the board. “The train station is acting like a gateway to an area between time; that’s where Hyungwon is.” 

 

“There’s an abandoned tunnel that they were planning to put a new train-line through but never finished- I saw it in one of the visions.” Hyunwoo speaks and Minhyuk nods to confirm it. “We can get there faster if we go through that.”

 

“That sounds,” Kihyun speaks hesitantly as they walk out of the lecture theatre. “very illegal.” 

 

“You say that like messing with the concept of space-time is an approved activity.” Hoseok laughs in response, although his voice betrays nervousness.

 

“Just call Jooheon and Changkyun and tell them to get a move on.” They check their watches, and break into a run.

 

_ Roadside  
12:16 [before] _

 

They first meet Hyungwon when he pulls Kihyun out of the way of a speeding car that swerves around the corner on a red light as Kihyun moves to step into the road. He’s out of breath as he explains that he’d tried six times to stop the car from hitting him- six failed attempts at pulling Kihyun out of the way. He holds up his pocket watch; introduces himself as a time traveler. 

 

Hoseok grabs onto Kihyun’s hand as if he’s afraid that another car will come barrelling around the corner in a shout of tyres and breaks.

 

“Do you want to come and get lunch with us?” Kihyun tries to shake Hoseok’s hand loose, feeling the circulation starting to cut off in his fingers. Hyungwon pauses in consideration. The clouds and cars around them seem to move a little slower, as if time is bending and shaping itself according to Hyungwon’s mood.

 

“I’m not going to pass up an opportunity for free food.”

 

_ The Tunnels  
16:55 [after] _

 

“We saw Hyungwon.” Changkyun and Jooheon are running when they answer the video-call Minhyuk sends them, laptop tucked under Jooheon’s arm as they run up the steps leading out of the computer room and into the fading daylight outside. They nearly bowl over passers-by as they make their way down the street and towards the train station. “I found a file in the security cameras of the station and he was there.” Changkyun sounds breathless as he speaks,not entirely from running. “He looked right at us.” 

 

“Hoseok and Kihyun figured out the time- we don’t have long left.” The door to the tunnel is easy to miss, guarded more by its hidden location than by barriers or locks. The steps downwards are lit by fluorescent tubes that span the length of the walls. Hyunwoo pulls out a torch, leading them down with hesitant footsteps. 

 

“We’ll be on our way to the station as fast as possible.” Changkyun affirms, turning to Jooheon to check their directions as they run. Minhyuk hangs up the call as the steps end and the tunnel widens out, stretching into the distance with dull red lights illuminating its length. 

 

Kihyun hangs onto his bag with one hand and grips Hoseok’s wrist with the other as they break out into a run again, footsteps echoing in the gloom of the tunnels. There’s water under their feet that kicks up into a spray as they move, Hyunwoo’s torch sliding over its surface and casting reflections like a mirror below them. It’s cold and dark, and Hoseok shifts his grip to hold onto Kihyun’s hand. 

 

“Do you have your calculations?” Minhyuk calls back to them, an anxious sort of exhilaration creeping into the edges of his voice as a brighter light starts to become present at the end of the tunnel, shedding silver on the uneven ceiling above them.

 

“Yeah they’re right here.” Kihyun struggles with his bag, pulling the notebook out and tucking it under his arm for security, feeling comforted by the knowledge that all the information he needs is there in his hand. “Does anyone have the time?”

 

“My watch isn’t working down here.” Hoseok speaks, confused. 

 

“Mine isn’t either.” Hyunwoo confirms, then stops in his tracks, almost slipping in the water under feet. “Did anyone just hear a train go past?” 

 

“No, just you.” The end of the tunnel draws ever closer. “Time isn’t working properly here- I think we’re going in the right direction.”

 

_ Cafe  
9:13 [before] _

 

“It’s too early to be taking photos, stop it.” Hoseok covers his face with his hands as Kihyun holds his camera up to him, snapping another picture of him shrinking into the back of his seat to avoid being seen. 

 

“Stop terrorising him, Kihyun.” Jooheon speaks up from his plate of scrambled eggs, dropping some on the screen of his phone as he tries to text, talk and eat simultaneously. Hyungwon is half-asleep in the corner, his face only a few centimetres from landing in his breakfast. He sits up, startled, when Changkyun pokes him in the shoulder with a fork and turns his laptop screen around to show him the small animated puppy he had just programmed to run around his desktop background. 

 

“Have you seen this?” Minhyuk slides his phone into the middle of the table, a news article brought up on its screen. Kihyun reads it out, curious.

 

“Apparently there’s been reports of people going missing while attempting time travel.” Six pairs of eyes turn to face Hyungwon. Kihyun reads on. “Constant jumping through space and time wears a hole around a person- the bigger the hole you create, the easier it is to fall into.” Hyungwon stops spinning his pocket watch around on the wooden table surface, feeling everyone watching him.

 

“Be careful, okay?” Hyunwoo cautions as Minhyuk closes the article.

 

“I’ve been time travelling for as long as I can remember- I think I’ll be okay.” Hyungwon smiles, unsure, and turns back to his breakfast.

 

_ Train Station  
17:02 [after] _

 

The station is crowded with commuters heading home from work when they burst out into the open. They narrowly avoid hitting passers-by as they swing out of the ‘restricted access’ door and into the crowd before anyone can question them.

 

“Changkyun, is there any way of clearing out the station?” Minhyuk pulls Changkyun and Jooheon into a video-call again, the youngest passing the phone quickly to Jooheon and grabbing his laptop, sitting down on the pavement heavily with a shout to give him two minutes.

 

Jooheon takes over the call. “Find somewhere out of the way- we’re going to set off the fire alarms and you don’t want to get caught up in the evacuation.” Hoseok points out the nearest bathroom and pulls them into it. They stand by the sinks as they watch Changkyun and Jooheon work their way into the train station systems from where they sit by the side of the road. The sudden wail of the fire alarms overhead indicates that they’ve been successful, and footsteps rush past the bathroom door, people pushing each other out of the way to exit the station. “We’ll be there in two minutes tops.” Jooheon affirms, as Changkyun packs up the laptop and takes off running again, ending the call.

 

The footsteps outside gradually fade, and Kihyun sticks his head out of the bathroom door, beckoning the others to follow him into the station, running down the vacated escalators and along to the platforms, time passing by in fast-motion. The fire alarm continues to split the air overhead as they skid to a halt on the platform, the tracks empty. 

 

“Two minutes.” Kihyun struggles to catch his breath, glancing down at his watch. The sound of a train approaching joins the fire alarm, despite there being no trains in sight. The arrivals board, flickering to itself, proclaims that there isn’t a train due for another ten minutes.

 

Changkyun and Jooheon join them, running down the escalator steps two at a time, almost tumbling onto the ground of the empty platform. They face the tracks, the sound of the approaching train growing louder still.

 

“Thirty seconds.” Hoseok reaches across and holds onto Kihyun’s hand again, the shakiness of his grip indicating that it’s more to comfort himself than anything else. 

 

The seconds tick past.

 

“Now! We need to go now!” The sound is deafening in the empty platform, but there’s still no train in sight.

 

“What do we do?” Minhyuk shouts back over the noise, expression panicked as he searches for a solution, trying to recall all of his dreams, all of his visions, anything that might tell them what to do.

 

Jooheon throws himself towards the train tracks, Changkyun lunging forward with a shout, attempting to grab hold of his sleeve to stop him. Instead of crashing into the barrier in a shatter of glass and reinforced plastic, tumbling down onto the ground below, he goes  _ through _ , the air warping around him momentarily before he disappears.

 

“Quick!” Kihyun follows, jumping through the glass of the barrier, and feels time itself opening up in front of his eyes.

 

_ The Train  
∞ _

 

When Kihyun opens his eyes, the lighting in the train flickers and the landscape outside passes by again and again, a constant loop of rattling carriages and stale air. Hoseok is lying a little way up the carriage from him, sprawled flat out on the ground. He peels himself off the floor slowly, looking around, disorientated. 

 

“Keep moving up the train.” Hyunwoo steps into their carriage from the one behind, Minhyuk trailing after him, looking around the walls of the train in wide-eyed horror. The landscape flashes past, endless, like a movie stuck on repeat, and the walls of the train warp in and out, almost as if it’s breathing. The hands on Kihyun’s watch spin, counter-clockwise.

 

They walk up the train, the floor swaying below them, everything moving fast and slow all at once. Changkyun is in the next carriage along, holding onto the edge of one of the train seats to balance himself. The sporadic warping and twisting of the air around Kihyun quickly becomes nauseating. 

 

Jooheon is standing by the door leading into the next carriage. He stares through the frosted glass, hands hovering over the button to open the automatic doors.

 

There, sitting in the final carriage, is Hyungwon.

 

Hyungwon looks up, shock and disbelief flashing across his face as they all pile into the carriage. He bolts out of his seat, stumbling backwards and clinging to the pole by the train doors to catch himself. 

 

“How-” He looks the same as he did when Kihyun saw him off at the train station, sweater vest and hair smoothed down with his hands rather than a brush, the cuffs of his shirt hanging past his fingers. “How did you-”

 

Hoseok is the first to move, rushing forwards and pulling Hyungwon into a hug, hanging on as if afraid that he would disappear if he so much as let go. Hyungwon is still wide-eyed with disbelief, gaze jumping from Hoseok to Kihyun to Minhyuk, Hyunwoo, Changkyun and Jooheon. 

 

“How did you get here?” Hyungwon blinks, once, twice, three times, expecting everyone to disappear from in front of his eyes. They don’t go anywhere.

 

“Two maths geniuses and a whole lot of lucky guesses.” Minhyuk inputs, smiling warmly towards Hyungwon and walking forwards to place a hand on his shoulder. “We weren’t exactly going to give up on finding you easily.”

 

“Kihyun, Hoseok, get us out of here.” At Jooheon’s prompt, Kihyun pulls out his notebook, dragging Hoseok over to look over the calculations with him. They work backwards, through the numbers that allowed them to jump through time, conferring in hushed voices and scribbling notes down into the book, equations and symbols and thoughts pouring out onto the pages in an attempt to get out. The train sways, side to side, and the land outside goes past, again and again. 

 

“What are they-” Hyungwon starts to question.

 

“You said you would leave the maths behind time travel to me- so that’s what I’m doing right now.” Kihyun bites his lower lip in frustration as another series of numbers refuse to fit together. 

 

“That’s-” Kihyun cuts Hyungwon off again.

 

“Dangerous? Yeah,” He laughs, and Hoseok takes over the notebook, adding in his own calculations. “But I’d prefer tearing a hole in space-time over the thought of you getting stuck in a place like this forever.” 

 

“I think we’ve got it.” Hoseok’s voice is uncertain as Kihyun checks over his equations.

 

“That’s as good as we’re going to get,” Kihyun takes a breath, standing up and glancing at the side wall of the train. “This could either go well, or horribly wrong. We’re just going to have to take that risk.”

 

Holding onto Kihyun’s wrist in one hand and Hyungwon’s in the other, Hoseok nods in the direction of the train wall. “Each passage of the landscape is about one second. When I say now, count sixty of them, then run.”

 

Seven of them stand, hand in hand, counting down the seconds in a place where time no longer exists.

 

“Sixty.”

 

They run.

 

_ Train Station  
18:01 [after] _

 

Kihyun hits his head on the cold stone of the train platform, his hand wrenched out of Hoseok’s grip as they tumble to the ground. There’s shouts, commuters jumping backwards to get out of their way as they land. 

 

The lights above the platform are luridly bright as Kihyun opens his eyes, the arrivals board swimming in front of his vision. His notebook is lying next to his head and the lenses of his glasses have shattered, cracks spiderwebbing across their surface.

 

Moving is painful, but he reaches over the top of Hoseok, lying face down on the platform, and grabs hold of Hyungwon’s hand.

 

Hyungwon tightens his grip, and Kihyun is smiling as he falls unconscious.

 

_ Cafe  
10:38 [after] _

 

“Hyungwon slept in again.” Minhyuk reports, looking up from his phone screen to take a drink of iced tea. The statement prompts a laugh from Kihyun as he looks over Hoseok’s physics assignment, berating him for small calculation errors. 

 

“I feel like that should be a given.” Kihyun pushes his glasses back up his nose, the frames of his new ones not quite fitting as well as the pair he broke on the train platform. Hoseok reaches up to run a hand through Kihyun’s recently re-dyed hair absentmindedly, threading his fingers through the grey strands. Kihyun shrugs his hand away. “I’m trying to help you, stop distracting me.”

 

“So, are you all coming to the art exhibit later? Mine and Hyunwoo’s pieces are going to be on display.” Minhyuk pockets his phone and looks across the table expectantly. Changkyun nods, distracted; busy talking through a section of code on his laptop screen with Jooheon. Minhyuk leans forward, propping his head up with one hand. He avoids the left side of his face so as not to touch the scrape healing there.

 

“I’ll see if I can make it.” Hoseok promises, scratching his head with the lid of his pen as he worries over the calculations in front of him. “I’m pretty sure figuring out time travel has used up all of my maths ability,” He laments to himself. “I can’t do anything now.”

 

“Sorry I’m late.” Hyungwon appears at the end of the table, close to drowning in a hoodie that’s far too big for him, his hair sticking up on one side as if he just rolled out of bed. Kihyun and Hoseok move to let him past, letting him slide into his seat by the window.

 

Leaves are falling from the trees outside, a cold breeze whisking them up and sending them cartwheeling down the pavement, past the window and out into the road, where cars drive past and clouds move overhead. Steam curls into the air from Kihyun’s coffee cup, drifting up to the ceiling then vanishing, and Hyungwon rests his head against the wall, eyes fixed on the clock hanging above the counter.

 

The seconds tick onwards, and time moves as it should do. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> if you made it to the end of this i congratulate you because even i almost gave up on reading it while editing and i was the one who wrote it in the first place  
> please feel free to come + talk to me on tumblr @bunyoul or on twitter @_renjuns if you have any questions or just want to yell about mx !!  
> all feedback is really appreciated!  
> ヽ(‘ ∇‘ )ノ


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